Last Note on Ayahuasca Dieta

Not to bore you guys, but once again the question of the dieta, the diet, has come up on a board on which I occasionally post. I was trying to stay out of it but it's just too juicy a topic for me to keep my hands off. So this was my response to a topic with the title of "Are there any of you out there who reject the traditional dieta?" or somesuch.
My entry:
At the Shamanism Conference in Iquitos last month, I raised some eyebrows--to say the least--when I flippantly answered a question about the dieta with something like, "the dieta was invented by white people 10 years ago."
I was flippant, but I don't think I was wrong.
I don't think most curanderos I know, among the older ones, ever adhered to any dieta as we know it. Not for the purpose of association with ayahuasca, anyway. Nearly every one ate a decent meal after they had cooked the medicine in the heat all day and before they served and drank it. I never saw one turn down a cup of coffee with milk and sugar just prior to the ceremony, nor salt if I happened to have it.
BUTTTTT, here's how I see it--and I recognize that it's my way of seeing it. And I might be seeing it through odd glasses since I never heard the term dieta until about 2002, when Hamilton, from Blue Morpho, said he couldn't shake my hand because he was on a dieta and forbidden to have contact with other humans. For him, I'm sure that was the right thing to do. And maybe others have been doing dietas for hundreds of hears. It's just that I find it odd because in the first 17-18 years of drinking the medicine it never came up.
Still, I think I can explain a lot of it to you.
Let's look at the primary things people discuss when talking dieta: no salt, no chile peppers, no pork, no sex.
SALT: In the jungle, prior to Fujimori, in the mid 1990s, supplying every tiny village in Peru's jungle a community metal boat, motor and 40 gallons of gasoline every month to ensure that people could get their goods to market, most river travel by locals from villages to towns was by dugout canoe. Once there was a community boat--a peque-peque with a 9hp motor--time to get from say, Aucayacu to Genero Jerrera, was cut from 5 hours to 2. The return upstream was cut from 6 hours to 3.
Subsequently, things people had rarely had were accessible.
In addition, in 2004-2007 or so, the Chinese brought in inexpensive peque-peque motors. So where there had pretty much only been a Briggs and Stratton available, and that was $1,300 US or so--out of the reach of nearly everybody--suddenly there were $250 motors available. A decent peque-peque motor can be had now for $180 (I just bought a 5 hp last month for a friend, so I know the price).
What does that mean?
Well, it means people go to town frequently. It means they bother to catch the large catfish, like zungaru and don seillo and can get them to town for sale in just a couple of hours. Prior to the availability of Fujimori's boats or cheap Chinese products, it was 11-12 hours to get to town and back. Which meant no fish would make it fresh. They had to be salted. So if you went to town to buy salt, you rarely used it on your food. No. It was what afforded you the ability to bring your fish, and hunted meat, to market to earn money for batteries, flashlights, an occasional shirt, a new machete. So salt was a very tightly held commodity despite it not costing very much.
CHILE PEPPERS: Chile Peppers in the jungle take a very particular type of soil to grow in. Not many places can produce them, hence, a kilo of charapitas (the primary jungle chile, the little yellow hot one) goes wholesale for 30-40 soles, and retails out at more than 100 soles when sold by the half-sol.
So nobody had chile peppers to begin with, and if you did you certainly didn't waste them when they brought in a week's pay (basic pay in Iquitos for working stiffs is still about 12 sols a day, though 20 sols is minimum wage and just a little less than police and teachers get). Pay on the river, for helping out building a house or whatever remains about 5 sols. So no one who grew charapitas would waste them on themselves and no one who didn't could afford them. So no chile peppers.
PORK: Essentially, the same as chile peppers but in spades. Pigs grow to be a couple of hundred pounds, even in the jungle. If you have pigs, you can't just eat some of it. You got to eat the whole thing. So when you raise them, you raise them for sale, not for food. So of course you don't eat pork in the jungle. BUT the dieta generally says nothing about eating sajino or wangana, the two peccaries in the jungle, and those are definitely pork. And majas, while a rodent, is the most pork like meat you'll ever find. All of these are staples of everyone who can trap or otherwise kill them, including every ayahuasquero and curandero I ever knew.
SEX: Well, I'm not sure how to explain this one, except to say that since all the curanderos I know have multiple girlfriends, wives and lots of kids--yes, there are exceptions, but not many of them out on the river--I'm not sure anyone pays attention to this. I do know that during intense periods with the medicine it never crossed my mind to have sex. That was a distraction. I mean, if you are going to be sleeping with your arms around a tree, getting bitten by all the bugs, bats, insects and everything else that protects that tree--in order to get to know it you have to get past those protectors--well, the last thing on your mind is sex. But I know of few people who've ever really slept with the plants to get to know them. Most just drink their essence and call it a day. But I do think sex is distracting and I also think that Ayahuasca has a very human trait of jealousy.
Now if what I'm saying is right, how did the dieta idea come up? Well, I think--and I've seen some videos from the 1980s and 1990s that show this--that gringos ask leading questions and then get answers and believe them to be correct answers. "When you were studying to be a curandero, did you eat pork?"
"No."
"When you were studying to be a curandero, did you....."
And so forth. What the questioner didn't ask was whether the person did those things when they were not studying to be a curandero. Because in most cases the answer would also have been "no".
I don't mean to downplay the importance of concentration in learning the medicine. I don't think you can be flip about it at all. But I don't know that what white people call dieta is anything that traditional people did specifically for ayahuasca: I think it was just part of living. Most curanderos, after all, were just fishermen or farmers who fished. They ate--and still do if they live on the river--boiled or grilled fish and plantains several times a day. It's their comfort food and it's their real staple. They'll eat rice if you give it to them but they wouldn't choose it over a good boiled plantain more than once out of the several meals they eat daily.
Even my team, my fantastic team, while they love my jungle guacamole and stir fried veggies, want plantain and fish at least 4-5 times daily. They typically go through 4 razimos--full arms of platanos with roughly 80 platanos each--in 6 days. So they really like them.
I don't think there is anything wrong with doing a dieta, mind you, I just don't think it's traditional. I think the white guys made it up asking leading questions.
On the other hand, most curanderos have told me that they have spent quiet time in the jungle, alone for weeks for the most part, unless someone was making them food, and that part of things I think is vital. Won't make you a curandero--that's something you're born capable of or not--but will help you get the most out of the medicine.
As noted at top: This is just my opinion and I totally respect those who are gonna say I'm full of it.

Doing a Song/Prayer

Okay, so sometimes you got to send something good to someone who needs it. I think it's part of the responsibility of having been shown other realities by the spirit of ayahuasca. SPOILER: If you think I'm crazy now, wait till I get on with this. So you might want to quit right now.
Now, once in a while someone asks me if I can have a healing arranged for them. Generally, I say that that's difficult, as Jairo, Julio's son and the person who runs the ayahuasca ceremonies for me and my groups in Peru, is difficult to get hold of from here. It involves getting in touch with people who will try to reach him...very long distance. So that's generally the end of that.
But several months ago it occurred to me that I might have a responsibility to try to coordinate those things I've been taught with those beings who are what I call my guardians, and perhaps they could effect cures. It seemed to me that I had to try, anyway. At the worst I'd be wasting my time. At best, something good would happen. And in between, it probably would be a little good, at least, to have that person have someone send concentrated good intentions to them--a nice force of electricity or something that wouldn't do them any harm. I mean, who doesn't like having people spend time dwelling on them?
Not that I knew what a prayer would be.
Anyway, I decided that a prayer would involve the medicines from Peru, a request to God--or whatever/whomever the big big force is to me--and to the spirits, guardians, magics and the spirits of my teachers--four of them gone now, including Julio, Pablo, Bertha and Everett--to ask for a little help in making the prayer/song have some power and oomph. It would also include a song.
I didn't know what song, but I knew that if I smoked myself with mapacho, thanked the four directions, was happy to be alive and willing to do the work, that a song would come out.
Somehow it all came together and I found myself smoking, singing, shaking a bundle leaf rattle and trying my best to suck out the sickness from someone.
At first it was for a day. Maybe one-half hour.
But things being things, I realized I needed to give it more time. So last Spring I did a 10 day song for a couple of people. Every day a different song came out and even now they change daily. And then when I came back from Peru and was asked to sing again by someone, I did a three day sing. Then a two day sing because life interfered and as I'd stalled on the third day--because it's a lot of work--I missed the third day of that. And just now I've finished a 4 day sing, though I think I will do one more day tomorrow because there seems to be some more work to do.
So here I am, an agnostic, trying my best to get the universe and many of her spirits to help me out while I try to heal some people from hundreds of miles away without the benefit of modern medical knowledge or even active plant extractions to give them. Crazy, huh?
Somehow this is a very different post than I meant to write. I meant to write about something funny that happens at the end of the song. The thanking part.
Years ago I went, after trying to be allowed to attend for a long long time, to several Southern Ute Native American Church peyote prayer meetings. Bertha, a wonderful woman who became a great teacher of mine though we never had a lot of time together, was the matriarch. Her brother Everett, was a Roadman for the meetings--the curandero--as was one of her sons.
The meetings took place in a tee-pee, at the center of which was a fire in the shape of an eagle, the firebird. We would sit around the outside wall of the tee-pee with the fire in the center, the fire-tender at one side of the door, his assistant on the other side of the door and the Roadman at the opposite end of the tee-pee from the door.
I've never been great at sitting cross-legged for long spells, and so it was fairly uncomfortable for me to sit for hours. I'd move around during the ceremony, shifting to keep my legs from falling asleep. The medicine was passed regularly, as was the water drum--a small kettle with water in it covered with hide that gave it a fantastic sound as those who were initiated played it and sang their songs.
During the night there was one break, about 15 minutes, for people to use the bathroom in the nearby house or just to stretch their legs. Other than that there really was no leaving the ceremony. So by the time 10 hours had gone by and morning was coming alive, it felt like it was time to meet the dawn. But that's not how the ceremonies went. That was when the medicine stopped being passed and the official ceremony was over, but that was just the beginning of the Thank You's. Someone would start: "I want to say thank you to the Great Father for allowing me to attend this meeting. And I want to thank all of you for sharing in this meeting that we held to help X with his/her problems. And I want to thank the Roadman for bringing his power to this meeting, and to the fire spirits for carrying my wishes through the tee-pee roof and into the air so they could reach their destination with all my power in them. And I want to thank grandma Bertha, without whom none of this would be possible...."
And I would, at least the first time, think that was that. But no. The person would go on to name their relatives, one by one, who couldn't attend. And they named their dead relatives whom they missed. And they thanked the medicine for giving them strength to admit to wrongs they'd done--and then we heard the wrongs, in detail--and then they thanked their home and the land and their animals--one by one--until you wanted to strangle them.
And when that person was done, someone else would start and do the same, then someone else, until half the people in the tee-pee had thanked a combined thousand individual people and things while the other half of the people in the tee-pee were ready to take out shotguns if anyone else dared to do any more damned thanking.
And now that I've been doing the song, I see how that happens. You think you're finished. You've done the work as best you can, as best I can, and then you just want to say, Hey spirits! Thanks for helping out! but I find myself starting to name my guardians and then deciding maybe I ought to do a quick prayer for my brothers and sisters, and suddenly I'm thanking each, along with their spouses and kids and grandkids and then Chepa and all of the Gormans here, and then I'm thanking the universe for being alive and for having this home and then.....and then I just want to take a shotgun out just to shut me up.
So there it is. 25 years removed from those Native American Ceremonies--it seems like yesterday--and I finally know why those people have to say all those thank you's to everyone and everything. It's because you're so in that moment, so in that state where you love everything, that you can't resist thanking as much of it as you can think of.
I'm glad it's come full circle on me. It's just great to be alive.

Another Decent Recipe

Okay. So today was a continuation of yesterday, which was not all that great. My little green truck has a new clutch but cannot pass inspection on emissions at the moment. Italo has changed several things to the tune of a few hundred bucks, cost, and it should pass. But the last time we took it to the inspection place, a couple of months ago, before I left for Peru, we were stopped by the police for an out of date inspection sticker and fined $245. A judge whom I've written some not great things about in the past said he basically forgave me and then lowered it down to $225. Thanks.
So I'm intimidated about trying to get the thing passed again, particularly if they're gonna sit right next to the inspection station--where I also change oil--and wait for guys like me to come in with late inspections.
And then about 10 days ago the clutch began going on my other green truck; the new one, 1998, which only has 184,000 miles on it--the other one has 299,994--and I had to rev that baby way over the top to get her to move off the red light line. Once she got to 60 she was fine: The problem was she spent a gallon of gas and was burning out the damned motor to get there. I'd asked her to last till I had a free day to fix her and she did: Italo got hurt playing soccer and had to take a couple of days off of work, so he was free to drive with me in his car to the mechanic to drop it off yesterday. I love my mechanic. I hate my mechanic. For years every bill was $473. The last two years, every bill is between $700 and $850. He's good but who knows? I believe in people but don't trust human beings, if that makes sense.
So I called Rick and asked if he could do a new clutch in one day and he said he'd try. We dropped the truck off this morning at 8:15 and it was done at 3:45. $741.43. Damn.
The clutch works but that's a lot of dough. Darnit.
Here's the thing: Rick's is about 5 stoplights past Walmart, which is where I shop daily. I shop elsewhere too, but that's where I check blood pressure, walk a couple of miles around the store a few times, say hello to people and so forth. But I don't go back to Walmart if I'm already past it. So today, picking up the truck, I was past it and just continued on from Rick's with the new clutch and light wallet to Two Bucks, where I got my four minis of bourbon and then headed home.
Home, I checked sales of my book and saw I was down 10 for the month. So if you're gonna buy it, buy it now and get me up to a reasonable $500 monthly royalty check, okay?
Then I asked Madeleina what she wante for dinner. The fridge held chicken breasts, short ribs and a couple of pieces of farm raised Atlantic Salmon.
She opted for the short ribs. So here's the meal:
Turn on oven to 325.
Heat heavy saute pan. Put in a little oil, Flour the short ribs, braise at high heat with salt and pepper.
Transfer braised ribs to glass corning ware. Add a bit of water/chicken stock to meat bits in pan along with 1/2 red onion, sliced into half rounds. Pour over meat in corning ware and place in oven.
Fill small pan with cool water. Add a little sea salt. Slice 4 medium red potatoes and place on heat. Add two tablespoons of olive oil with minced garlic (if you know how I cook you'd know there is always a small cup or jar of chopped garlic sitting in olive oil for just such occasions. Add 2 cups of good chicken stock that you happen to have in the freezer, left over from the last time you made a good chicken stock--at least once a week, okay?
Put another pan with salted water on: Put in florets of broccoli, cauliflower and chopped asparagus. Heat, cook, drain.
When the ribs are done, about 45 minutes, take them out of the oven to cool. Pour juice into saute pan with earlier drippings. Add 2 tablespoons of minced garlic--drain the olive oil as you have enough oil--, heat. Add one whole diced red onion. Add a whole diced organic beefsteak tomato when onions and garlic are done. Add one diced poblano chile if in season. Add the kernels of one ear of sweet summer corn left over from last night and cut from the cob nicely.
Sautee all veggies in juice. Add 3 or 4 ounces of extremely reduced chicken stock--just chicken jello, really--and reduce while cooking veggies. When veggies are close to soft, add your favorite barbeque sauce and mix. This is the lazy part. Then add salt/pepper and whatever else the sauce needs.
Drop meat into sauce and slurb it all around for about 15 minutes until the meat is entirely inundated with the crispness of the sauce.
Serve meat.
Drain and serve potatoes.
Put cooked veggies in what's left of pan drippings and saute for a couple of minutes till the veggies are hot and flavorful.
Serve with fresh watermelon slices, very cold, and good water and a glass of champagne.
Wear a bib. It's messy but good.
Have a great night, everybody.

Something About Medicine

Okay, for some of you this post is going to seem quite off the wall. I understand. For some others, who have worked with plant medicines, or spent time meditating and are familiar with the other realities, it might not be so crazy.
I've a good friend...well, I've a client from a fairly recent trip who has something very unique about him. Madeleina was absolutely taken by his demeanor and basic generosity of soul. So was I.
He did medicine on the trip to Peru with me, and then stayed on for months. He's still there. And he's done more medicine. And he wrote me about a month ago that he had an ayahuasca dream wherein he met a man--a spirit that looked like a man to my friend-- smoking mapachos, the black tobacco cigarettes that are common in Amazonia and vital to the rituals there. And this man was in a sort of dark museumish place. And my friend was at first startled and a bit frightened but relaxed when the man told him to "look around" a bit, to see if there was something interesting there. Now to me, that's a special thing: To get invited to look at things that seem magical to us in ordinary reality, but things we can sometimes utilize to help people in ordinary reality, is a pretty fantastic thing.
Later in the ayahuasca dream, my friend met a little girl--a spirit that my friend saw as a little girl--who told him some things about some of his past experiences and then told him she would be with him always to help him. Again, to me that is very special. That's a guardian. As someone raised Catholic, and as a former alter boy, we would have called them guardian angels. As an adult I know they're real. They're the ones that keep you from stepping out in front of that bus you simply didn't see, the one that would have killed you. And they're the ones that make your car stall utterly unexpectedly just before someone runs through the light in the opposite direction going 100 miles per hour. They protect us. Why? I've no idea. I guess they're assigned or find us curious or get something out of watching us blunder along on this plane.
But my friend got one. Very very good.
And so, that led me to write him this note. It was about his responsibility now that he's got a place to find things people might need and a spirit who's volunteered to help him.
Dear X:
Just reread this for the 8th or 12th time. How fucking wonderful. Invited to
> explore. Given a guardian to answer questions. I hope you understand what a
> rare treat this is and treat it as such.
> I've just finished the second day of a prayer. That involves cama lunga,
> mapacho smoke, florida water, a shacapa, and some invisible things. I sing
> and call on the magics, red magic that moves through all the blood of
> everything in the universe; green magic, which moves through the verdancia,
> the trees, and rivers fish, earth and and snakes; white magic, which lights
> the world with stars and suns and moons and the light inside people, and
> black magic, the deep deep magnetic field, the magma that holds all things,
> large and small, together and keeps them moving in a way that allows the
> entire universe, known and unknown, to keep moving in rhythm--I call on the
> magics to help heal someone or something that has asked me for help. I can't
> help. I'm just me. But the guardians can help and I need to pray to call
> them. I need to sing. The song arrives when I need it. That's one of their
> gifts.
> Sometimes healing happens. Unimaginably.
> So treat your guardian girl with love and respect. She's offered her
> help, as has the man smoking mapachos who said you were free to look around.
> LOOK AROUND. Dream him, dream his space. Learn his space. He might have a
> million secrets you need hidden there.
> Just be joyful you've been made aware of helpers and thankful you have
> them. Use them, don't abuse them or you might lose them.
> It might also become a burden to you someday: People will know you have
> power. You won't have power but you will have helpers and people's souls
> will recognize that and ask you for help. You will need to help when it's
> appropriate. That often interferes with what you had planned on a given day.
> But that becomes your job.
> I don't mean to rattle on. I mean to tell you something I know about my
> circumstance and think you might have been initiated into something like it
> as well. And so I have to tell you what I've told you. It's part of the
> unspoken pact.
> I will finish my three day prayer for my friend and a few others
> tomorrow. It will be inconvenient because I have a serious deadline for a
> story. So what. The prayer is what I have been assigned to and it's bigger
> than my deadline. Though actually, the prayer will not interfere. It never
> has. Sometimes I can spend an hour or more and look at the clock and see
> that not 5 minutes of real earth time have passed. And if tomorrow I'm told,
> somehow, that I need another 10 days of prayer, I will do it.
> There are leaps of faith out here.
> Take good steps with your gift and she will walk with you always.
> And don't tell too many people--unless you write a book--because they
> will think you crazy.
> I hope I'm not being arrogant here.
> Peter G

In the Dark, As Always

I'm often in the dark. People don't imagine that, I suppose, because of the way I carry myself. But I'm often in the dark. Particularly with Chepa. You know, just when I think I know, she turns the world on its head. Last week, after the kids told me she was going to Indiana and on to Michigan--to visit her boyfriend, and then to take the kids to see their ailing grandpa--all was good. Then on maybe last Wednesday, the day before she was to leave, she asked me to make dinner for everybody and then set the menu. I was fine with it as it was lime-chicken with veggies, fresh corn and I forget what else. So when dinner time came around and she wasn't there, I called. She said she'd be right over. Cool. I started the chicken. Soon after, Marco showed up with the girls, Sierra and Alexa, and my granddaughter Taylor Rain.
Seems mom was not coming over: She'd forgotten to mention that her boyfriend was coming into town and that she'd really asked me to make dinner so that I could babysit while they had some private time.
Okay. Didn't like that but did like seeing the kids.
Then Chepa showed up, said she was starving, and proceeded to eat. I went out for a smoke. Then Chepa left. Then I went back inside to do dishes: nearly all the chicken was gone. Seems she'd made a to-go plate for the boyfriend.
I was in the dark. See what I'm talking about? Just when you think you got it figured, you wind up babysitting and cooking for the boyfriend. What the heck?
I'll mention it to her when she returns from Michigan. Provided she returns. For all I know they've all flown off to live in Morocco or Bali by now. I wouldn't know. No one has turned on a light.
Right now I'm in the dark again.
I'm reading a major study as the starting point for a cover story for my local alternative weekly. The study, several hundred pages long, was written purposely to keep people like myself from understanding anything in it. I know that, which is why I know it will be a good story. If I can decipher it. Right now, I'm in the dark. I've got to learn a whole new language of sorts just to begin to get it. Then I'll have to go to the experts to interpret what I can glean. I know the people who did the study are dirty; I know their short form conclusion will not be what's actually written in the study. I also know that they know that few people will bother trying to understand the whole several hundred pages. So I'm in the dark.
And I'm in the dark with Madeleina these days too. Pretty much ever since we've come back from Peru she's challenged me on things every day. She'll ask me if I've signed certain papers yet and I'll say "no, not yet, darling." And then she'll get exasperated and say, "Dad, they have to be signed and you have to sign them now!"
"When are they due?"
"I think next week."
"Well, then I've got time."
"No, dad. They have to be signed now..."
Anyway, the first several times she did that I wound up screaming or wanting to scream. So I asked the powers that be for a little insight, a little light to be shed on my darkness.
And the powers that be were nice enough to do it. They told me, or let me see, or however it happens, an answer. And the next time Madeleina started in on something, rather than responding negatively, I said: "You know that you and I have been arguing for the first time in your life lately..."
"I know, dad. That's because you're stupid sometimes..."
I bit my tongue.
"I know I'm sometimes stupid. But here's the thing: Until the last couple of months you didn't know that. Plus, until we came back from Peru, for your whole life, you just gave me your papers and I took care of them. You didn't even read them. But now you're 14 and you're reading the papers and you're freaking out and imagining that I'm so stupid that if you don't get on me things won't get done. But here's the thing, Madeleina: You've got to think back to the first 13 years. Did you get fed? Did I remember to go to the store to buy food, remember to cook it, remember to ask you for input on what we ought to eat? Did I get all your school books--I mean along with mom, of course--and get you to school and remember to make you good lunches? Did I get all the paperwork done on time?"
"Am I supposed to answer that?"
"Yes as a matter of fact."
"Well, okay, so you didn't mess up..."
"So why are you so suddenly sure I am going to mess up now? Why do you think you won't have the dress for the quinceniera or won't get your band stuff paid for or won't get the medical papers filled out? Have I gotten so old so quickly that if you don't yell at me I won't remember anything?"
She started to laugh. "You might have Alzheimers, dad. You never can be too careful...."
"Don't wish that on me, girl,"
"I'm not. I'm just saying, maybe all that pot you used to smoke burned out your brain...."
"Not hardly, baby. I think the truth of the matter is that you're suddenly becoming a grown up and want to challenge me. Cause if you're grown up, then I must be old, and if I'm old, I won't remember anything, so you have to save me..."
"Something like that."
"Well, forget about it. You're welcome to be smart as you like, and you're welcome to fill out any paperwork you like, but it's gonna be a long time before I lose my edge. So have a little faith, eh?"
It was a nice moment of light in the darkness.
This morning she got up while I was working on the computer and came into the office/living room and crashed out on the couch behind me. She was so beautiful. She was just my little girl again for a little while.
And then she woke and remembered that she had to read Dickens' Tale of Two Cities and burst into tears. She doesn't understand a word of it. Not surprising: His writing is as complicated for her to understand as the report I'm reading is to me.
So I asked her to bring me the book--after I fed her scrambled eggs with cheese, cantaloupe and a juice made of fresh strawberries, a banana, orange juice, spring water and a little milk--and I began to read it to her. "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times...."
It took us nearly an hour to get through the first three page chapter. She simply has no context. So when we were done she yelled in frustration: "So why didn't he just write that it was 1775 and in England and France everything was freaking chaos and the only people who didn't know it were the kings and queens of those countries? That's it. Then end. First chapter done."
Actually, I don't know why he didn't write that. He really does write beautifully, but it's pretty incoherent for kids who've grown up with computers and who say things like RTFM as if it's English (it means Read the Fucking Manual).
I guess everybody around here is in the dark sometimes, eh?

2012 Amazon/Machu Picchu Trips

Okay, time to weigh in on next year's trips.
(Madeleina, who is cutting two heads of garlic to refill my garlic/olive oil cup, just cut in to say "Remind me to take a shower tonight!", which I will do, but where is she going to take a shower? I mean, it's heavier than it looks....)
Anyway, I'm doing 4 trips in 2012. Two of them will be 21-day long trips--in January and June--covering the jungle and mountains and Machu Picchu and include Ayahuasca and San Pedro and magic shrooms and the Matses' medicines, sapo and nu-nu. Bit trip. Expensive but worth the price of admission.
Those two trips can be done wholly or in part, either jungle or mountain. Cost is $4400 for the 21 days (not including airfare or alcohol or walking around money and some meals) but including everything else, from boats to hotels, to my team, to entrance fees to trains, to ceremonies.
The other two trips are 9 1/2 day jungle intensives: Get ready to bare your soul to the universe cause these are fantastic and intense. These cost $1800 and include everything but airfare and walking around money.
All four trips will change your life for the better. My team, the river, the jungle, the Amazon sky, the mountains, the medicines, the ruins.....hell, all I've got to do is get you to the right place at the right time and then get the hell out of the way and let the rest do the magic. And what magic there is! Ask people who have been there. I wouldn't do these trips if I didn't love doing them. And I love doing them.
Dates: The January 21 day trip starts on Saturday, January 7, and runs through the morning of Saturday, January 28. The jungle portion alone runs from Saturday, January 7 through Thursday afternoon, January 19 and costs $2400. The Lima/Cuzco/Sacred Valley/Machu Picchu end of things runs from Thursday evening, January 19 through Saturday morning, January 28 and costs $2200. Both together cost $4400.
The June 21 day trip, starts on Saturday, June 2 and runs through Saturday morning, June 23. Cost: $4400. Jungle only: June 2 through Thursday afternoon, June 14 with a $2400 cost. Mountain portion only runs from Thursday afternoon, June 14 through Saturday morning June 23 and costs $2200. See above for what's included and what's not. Essentially, your spending money for gifts, your alcohol, some meals and your airfare are not included. Everything else is included.
The February and July trips are both 9 1/2 day jungle intensives. We'll do magic shrooms, ayahuasca twice, sapo and nu-nu, go night canoeing, bathe in the river, walk in primordial swamps, hike in pristine first growth canopy, collect plants to eat and plant medicines and whatever else we can squeeze in.
The february dates are Saturday, Feb 4, through the morning of Monday, Feb. 13.
The July dates are not set yet as they are set to coincide with the start of Alan Shoemaker's Shamanism Conference. Generally we start around the 7th of July and run through the 16th, but that changes depending on when the conference is set.
Cost for either jungle intensive is $1800 and includes everything but walking around money, airfare and any alcohol you consume in Iquitos (no alcohol in the jungle, please).
These are pretty fantastic trips, I think.
So anyone interested, please contact me at peterg9@yahoo.com and we can go from there.
And thanks for listening to this advertorial.

Where Are We, Death Valley?

Whew! Not to kill you guys with two blogs in one day, but I just have to mention the temperatures here. Today was Dallas/Fort Worth's 33rd consecutive day of 100 degrees F or more. No rain for a couple of weeks prior to that or during those 33 days. A place up the road burned wildly from what's believed to be an errant cigarette butt tossed from a car. It's that dry here.
But it's also hot. Last few days, very hot. Last week it was 104-106. You know, hotter than it ever gets here but bearable. Yesterday hit 110. Today, according to the radio, hit 112. It will drop to 108 by 7 PM, and then down to 100 or so by midnight. That is not sittin' on a porch swing weather by any means.
Tomorrow might hit 113, which is, I think, the highest temp ever recorded here in the Fort Worth area, and about what Death Valley does during August. We are not supposed to be anywhere near Death Valley hot. We're north Texas, a central state and several hundred miles from the most northern Mexican border. So if we're hitting 112, it's hot.
And you know what? Not having air conditioning in the car, well, you really feel it. I've done two showers and changed three shirts today. My badly insulated house is at 84 degrees while the thermostat is set at 70. And I almost need a sweater in here after working outside for 20 minutes. Can't wait to see the electric bill. Fortunately, I'm in a co-op, so that while they'll charge me $500 for the month, they'll also send me $25 in co-op earnings. Perfect.
Tomorrow Madeleina are going to take my truck out from under the carport and let it sit in the sun. Then we're gonna fry an egg on the hood and she's gonna narrate and make that her new video on Youtube.com, under madeleinag. It ought to be good.
Next nine days look to be more of the same though a little cooler. From up to 113 tomorrow to down to 103 (highs for the day) a week from Friday. Nice and sunny though.
I'm not sure it's good to be sucking down all this superheated smog, you know? Just sayin'...
I am giving the goats and Boots a lot of water with ice in it. Everybody seems to like that. And I'm putting Boots' chicken legs in the fridge to cool them before I serve him (two pounds of chicken daily....sorry, chickens!).
I knew it was going to be hot today when I stepped from my house to go to my car for smokes at 8 AM and the temperature, in the shade, was 94. By 1 PM it was 102, and when I just came back from driving to town, at about 6 PM, it was still 106. That's in the shade. No sun whatsoever, on a porch surrounded by plants. So maybe the 112 was a little less than the real temp.
Ah, well, the good thing is that when it cools to 85 by 4 AM, and the house cools to the 70 degrees the AC is set for, well, it feels so icy cold that I put a blanket on and go into the best damned sleeps I've had since I left New York in the winter of 2002.

Get Real Lucky, Sometimes

I get real lucky, sometimes. And I don't forget to say thanks to the guardians. Today's luck came at the end of a chain of events that didn't seem to have anything to do with each other.
I was working this morning, trying to track down the answer to a question that I need to make my next column of Drug War Follies for Skunk magazine shine. Comes up around 1:15 and I think, what the hell, let's just go to Fort Worth, pick up my paycheck and some fresh fish and call it a day.
Just then a guy I'd promised to call a couple of days ago called. It was related to a new story. I didn't answer and was ready to leave when I thought, what the heck, just call him and get that done. So I did. We spoke about 45 minutes when Chepa burst in and gave me an unexpected hug. I told the guy I'd call him back tomorrow. Chepa, it turned out, was having lunch with her sisters on some salt fish I brought back from the Amazon for her and she wanted some Margarita mix--left over from the wedding--and some ice. I told her I didn't have any ice but she said that Sarah had told her I still had a couple of bags in the freezer in the garage. So I said, let's go, I'll look.
On the way to the garage Chepa pointed out that Little Goat Guy had gotten his cord all tangled up with the tree swing and told me not to forget to fix it later. He's been back a few days and is still tied up because I have not finished closing all the holes in the fencing around the property that the goat made last year.
So I came back in, brushed my teeth, and suddenly Marco showed up. He was looking for his wallet. Well, I helped look, which led us to a large closet in his old room, the floor of which was covered in college texts and notebooks that belong to someone none of us know. So I decided to clean that out, and wound up with a big box of garbage. Too much garbage to leave in the house, so I brought it out--Marco had meanwhile found his walled in Italo's room, where he and Italo and changed into tuxedos for Italo's wedding--and put it in the garbage area.
And while I was doing that I saw the bale of hay and bag of goat feed I'd bought yesterday. The hay had been annoying since one of the three rear window panels of my 1998 Ford Ranger is broken and the hay was being sucked in so fast while I was on the highway that there was a virtual hay storm in my car. So when I saw that hay, I was going to leave it where it was, but then the little goat, Minute, saw it from across the fence and started braying for it. So I decided to roll it over to where the goats were and let them have a feast. And when I got to the fence gate, I realized that Little Goat Guy had wildly exacerbated his position to where his tongue was turning blue and his eyes were popping out of his head.
I left the hay where it was, raced over and undid the collar so that he could get his breath. In a few minutes his eyes were back to normal, though he didn't try to move until he'd had some fresh water and a few tiny mouthfuls of hay.
Now this is why I talk about the guardians: Left to my own devices, I never would have needed to get that ice, and Chepa would not have pointed out that the goat was tangled up. And even later, left to my own devices, I would have left him tangled until I got back from the city. But of course he would have been dead long before that. But by Chepa coming for ice, then Marco coming to look for a wallet, which wound up producing the garbage that led me to notice the hay still near the truck, which led me to feel guilty for not wanting to do the work to get it to the goats....well, that's what saved the goat's life. And I don't think that was luck. I think that was the guardians pulling the strings to get everything in place to save that beautiful goat's life.
Thanks, universe. You're the best.

Alone Again, Naturally

Okay, so for the second time since I've been back I'm alone tonight. Chepa and the kids might surprise me with a visit for some watermelon and grapes but I'm pretty much alone. And while I was alone all day--except for bringing the kids donuts this morning and visiting them for a little while to see poor Madeleina after her first marching band practice practically dead on Chepa's sofa--Dad, when you make a mistake you have to do 20 pushups and I can't even do one!--well, I've been alone all day. Which meant I got a story done for the Fort Worth Weekly and nearly finished my column for Skunk magazine as well. Extra cool.
Lonesome, but cool.
Did get a reasonably nice check in the mail--which comes promptly between 4 and 5 PM daily--from the June sales of my book at Amazon. Nice to know it's still selling 100+ copies a month, which is pretty much what it's done since it came out last year. I would love it to go wild and sell 50,000 copies one month but still, some people are reading it. And lots of those people write me. I've got a lot of super excellent letters from strangers who found it a great read. Good. That's what I was hoping for.
Here's a story: When I was a fairly young teenager I was writing a lot of poetry--oh, the angst of youth and pimples, blue balls brought on by necking with Kathy O for hours and never being allowed to go further, and not knowing there was an end to masturbating until I'd actually had real sex with a girl--some of which I'd read to my mom. And my mom, pretty astute lady, would ask me what this or that line meant. And I'd explain. And then she'd say--and we probably did this half-a-dozen times over the years--"Well, are you going to explain that to everyone who reads your poetry? Because if you are, you won't have a lot of readers, it'll just take too long. So why don't you say what you just told me in the poem in a way that I and others can understand? Then you can sell your work to lots of people and not worry about having to go to their homes to explain it."
I hated her the first time she said that. It was so cold, so cruel, so on the money.
When I grew up I gave up poetry but always write so that everybody knows that the heck I'm talking about. I think. Or I hope. Or that's what I try to do, anyway.
And so I think even people who don't know about ayahuasca could have a reasonable change of reading my book and getting something from it, just like people who come on my trips to the Amazon and don't drink ayahuasca or do the Matses' medicines sapo and nu-nu still get a lot out of the trips.
(QUICK AD: Upcoming trips in January and February, then again in June and July. Sign up now cause I'm gonna sell out to excellent people! ALSO: Time to stock up on the book, Ayahuasca in My Blood--25 Years of Medicine Dreaming for your early Christmas/Hannukkah/Kwanzaa/Tribal Solstice presents).
Anyway, so I'm alone. But I did good and pulled the trigger on Madeleina's new flute. It is a beauty: a floor model from Taylor Music in South Dakota--from Geimenhardt, supposedly a good flute maker. it's open-hole with a B foot and a Gizmo key and comes with corks for the open holes. None of which makes sense to be but makes it easier to swallow the $895 price tag--which is a freaking bargain from the $1350 or so it sells for completely new.
I'm just thinking of my friend Phoenix, whose father bought him a cheap little guitar when he wanted to play and told him to learn enough to earn something better. Phoenix plays beautifull and so I suspect his dad was happy to shell out the bucks for something that could make his kid's music sing. I feel the same way about Madeleina. She's spent hundreds and hundreds of hours practicing, learning, and now needs to move up from a beginner's flute. Good for her. She earned it with her practice and she also earned it working with me in Peru for nearly two months. So I bought it with a thrill running up my neck rather than a knot in my stomach.
I'm getting distracted thinking of the tiny new potatoes I have on the stove. I better go check them.
They look fine. I'm cooking them in water left from cooking asparagus and then spinach. It's got real good sea salt in it, and a little garlic oil (the garlic has been soaking in the olive oil for 48 hours) a bit of chicken stock from chicken last night and then a few sprigs of cilantro. They're gonna be good boiled potatoes.
And I'm still in love with sword fish so I've got a piece of it--sorry fish. I won't complain if one of your brothers eats me. I know it will hurt but I will deserve it--in a bit of the same garlic oil. It's nice and low right now. And then, probably boring you who know the damned recipe, when it's browned on one side and nearly done on the other, I'm gonna add garlic, tiny diced red pepper (half a pepper as I'm dining alone), three diced slices of red onion, and half a tiny bottle of capers, with the juice. Maybe a teaspoon of butter to bind it all together.
The sides are maybe one of the tiny potatoes, asparagus (parboiled then sauteed in a bit of butter and good balsamic vinegar) and spinach (parboiled and later to be cooked in garlic and olive oil). I know, I've done it 100 times. But I still like it. And I never had it with the potatoes before.
And I'm gonna eat that feast in front of the television while watching Nicholas Cage and Eva Mendez in Ghost Rider, an insane movie that I happen to like watching every now and then, if just to watch Cage ride a flaming Harley custom up the side of a high rise.
Okay, so that's the single life. Not fantastic, but pretty rich if you milk it. I could do worse, right?
It's all good. I hope you're all having a great night, wherever you are.

Not Wild About Change

Okay, so we've (Madeleina and I) been back from Peru for nine days now. Seems like we should have integrated. We are. But it is always hard to switch modes, and harder still when there are changes. We came back to see that Italo's Sarah, who is so beautiful and nice, had rearranged some of the art in my rooms. Specifically, my office, the bathroom and the kitchen. Plus, a wax cast of Madeleina's left hand, made several years ago at the Wax Museum in Dallas on a school trip, had melted over the lava lamp it has sat on for several years.
That was no one's fault. No one was living here for several weeks and the family only came over sporatically to feed Boots, the Wonderdog, vet for rats and keep appliances running. No AC was on and so the hand melted. But Madeleina put all her rejection of all the changes into that wax hand and cried for hours. What she was really upset about was that the art was rearranged, my writing trophies and certicates were in different places, the art in the bathroom was now in the hallway, and new pieces that Sarah thought would be good for the kitchen and bathroom were in place. Plus, one of our beloved rugs was folded up and in Marco's old room, as were several art pieces, a couple of end tables, lamps and so forth.
So Madeleina was not crying about the hand, exactly, but that it represented change she had not designed.
I cried too, but then after 44 years of travel a couple of months a year, I know that things will be changed when I return. And so while I abhor the changes, I welcome them. If someone thinks what they're gonna buy--like Sarah bought me a 6 piece couch in the living room and threw out my old and comfy couch/chair/ottoman--well then, I cry a little and then celebrate her taste.
Much tougher for Madeleina.
And today we brought the goats home from Shelly S's. house. She is the goat lady who at times has dozens of goats. She breeds them, sells their milk for cheese and generally loves them. She's the one I got the goats from so I pay her to board them--$200 for two goats for 2 months- and she said they were easy students.
But now they are in the backyard. Over 1 1/2 acres to play in but all they are doing is braying. I'm not sure what they want but will bet it has something to with having been taken from the place where they were for the last 8 weeks.
So I'm just saying, change is tough on everybody.
To get over it I made a shrimp soup: Garlic, minced, with red onion, diced, and celery, diced, as a mirapoix. THEN sautee shrimp, then add commercial tomato soup and pepper, then add water, then shrimp shell essence, then shrimp and a few minutes later the mirapoix. Then small diced potatoes. Then diced scallions and cilantro, pepper and angel hair pasta. Then just be patient for half an hour.
So here it is: We came home las week and still don't have our seagoing feet nearly under us.
And now I have to attend the soup.
But know that Boots, the goats, the birds, and the family, are all slightly freaked at the thought that changes were made. Because we liked things the way they were. We are intimidated by change until we integrate it. I hope you're better than that, but we're not.
Sometimes we're not strong enough.

After the Party Comes the Cleanup

Okay, the wedding was beautiful. I had no idea how many touches would go into it--and I worked hundreds of weddings as a kid at Cresthaven Country Club in Whitestone, New York. This had floating lights, floating flowers, a friend of the other side of the family who drove in from South Dakota to pitch in as photographer--fantastic--and deejay--freaking brilliant. We went on a little late because it took a long time to get pictures done at the Botanical Garden of Fort Worth--a good enough reason to visit Fort Worth and hang at my house a couple of days--but otherwise no hitches.
And yes, Chepa's boyfriend and the father of her new kids came in to town and I was good: I walked up and introduced myself, and later helped patch one of the baby's knees. I provided the bandaids and he applied them. He noted that Alexa preferred the mickey mouse bandaids and I held my tongue: Did not say, "How would you know? I'm the guy raising them!" or anything like that. And when it came time, about 11 PM, that I thought I might, I simply went to bed and let the party rock on. Marco and Italo both commended my behavior. Marco was particularly nice: "Dad, you're the freaking coolest person I ever met. You made a great party, you dealt with Troy, you didn't drink all night. I want to be like you when I grow up."
I countered that it was a lucky day, but really it was just doing what needed. Difficult for me because I happen to still love Chepa. But I did it and I am okay with how I behaved.
The party part was a blast. There was food for 200 and people ate and ate. Not just what I made but what Sarah's mom and dad and grandma and grandpa made. Plus what Chepa and her sisters made. Plus platters from a supermarket. Fortunately, Italo and Sarah's friends are mostly in their early 20s, so they can eat like horses. And drink. They went through a keg of beer, a couple of cases of bottles, nearly 4 liters of Cuervo Gold in Margarita's and then 1 1/2 cases of champagne. Plus a couple of bottles of Stoli that someone brought.
Still, everyone behaved wonderfully.
And when the kids were getting married, wouldn't you know it that I was the guy standing behind all the chairs, bawling. Just thinking about my Italo and quietly sobbing. That's why I stood behind everyone. No need to go public with a private waterfall.
And the girls, Madeleina, Sierra, Alexa and little Taylor Rain, well, they were simply magic. I just cannot get enough of any of them. I mean, I just had Madeleina in the jungle and mountains of Peru with me for 50 days and I'm still thinking she is about the coolest person on the planet to hang with. And she looked gorgeous--pronounce that gojus--in her orange bridesmaid dress.
So that's that.
And just now we finished several hours of cleanup. Tomorrow the dump and then the rounds of returning things like the air conditioner unit Sarah's dad rented for the garage, or the tables and chairs, the tent guy's stuff and the beer keg I got.
But it's done yet and I've a fridge full of leftovers if anybody's hungry. Let me know.
And spend one second sending them good vibes. Marriage is tougher than most people think--as most of you know.
Appreciate it.

Back Home Again...Life is Freaking Grand, eh?

Hello all. I've been away, working in Peru for 50 days and so have not been in touch. I'm sorry. But work is hard there. I've a team of 12-15 to oversee, trips to plan for, food to buy, babies who are sick, families that need help. Hell, it's like I'm a freaking one man money machine trying to keep up with it all. Not that I mind. My guests give me the money and I distribute it. That's how I see it. And this time, with my Madeleina, now 14, with me for the second June/July trips in two years, we actually made a few bucks. How? First, because she's such a good guardian she wouldn't let me have a woman closer than 20 feet and never ever alone. Which kept me from getting robbed or so gleeful that I gave someone $500 for the hell of it. Secondly: She wouldn't let me give anyone scholarships. Last time she was with me I gave everyone a break and by the time we added it all up I'd given $10,000 on breaks and came home broke. This time she wouldn't hear of that.
"That's my new flute, dad! Let them pay! You don't even charge enough to begin with!"
Which may not be true, but I limited scholarships and came home with enough to pay the IRS their blood money from several years ago and next month's mortgage and to buy the food and booze for my son Italo's wedding to my daughter-in-law, Sarah, the mother of my grandchild, Taylor Rain.
The trip was fantastic: Those of you who have been on it and were great guests, well, you know. This was just magic all the way with all the powers lending a hand to keep me joyful, and when I'm joyful, well, the rest of the world--at least our little world on the Amazon--tends to fall in line. So that was fantastic.
And now I'm ready to cook for tomorrow. I've cleaned and minced 15 heads of garlic and put it all in good olive oil to give me a foot up, but tomorrow it's brisket, Peruvian chicken, links, sausage, fresh beans, macaroni salad, potato and egg salad, hot dogs for the kids, a chocolate fountain, marinated and bar-b-qued asparagus and broccoli,and anything else I can conjure. The sisters, Italo's aunts will bring food as well. Heck, there are 100 people supposedly coming. Unfortunately, one of them is Chepa's boyfriend, the father of her new babies, the ones I'm sort of raising about 8 months a year because he's living in another state the last several years. I've never met him, and don't need to. I know he exists. No hiding from reality but he ain't gonna be my best friend.
I'll deal with it, I guess. I won't have a drink as a first step, lest I blurt out: Why am I paying about $6000-10,000 a year to feed and clothe your babies? Why can't you carry your end?
No drinks tomorrow. Be nice. It's my kid, Italo's day. Italo and Sarah. And their baby. And that's a good thing. Everybody is coming. I'll be on best behavior.
As for you all, I'll be back soon. Sorry to keep you waiting but those who know me in Peru know that when I am there I am there 100 percent and there is no time for anything else.
Now that I'm hear, I'm here for Italo and Sarah for a few days, 100 percent. And then it will be your turn.
Thanks for letting me have the space I occasionally need. I appreciate it.
And I hope it's all going well with you. Let me know.

Something About Iquitos

Okay, so someone on a forum I occasionally write on posted something to the effect that Iquitos is a patriarchal society. I begged to differ. I think it's interesting, so here is what I wrote:
Slightly off topic but need to respond to Hazle-ra regarding the culture in Iquitos. He calls it patriarchal. I beg to differ. Very very matriarchal society. Women rule the roost. Even with sexual advances, at least among Peruvians. Enter gringas, or women of other cultures and yes, the men can seem grabby, and probably are. But then that is their culture and it is the women who let it happen and only on their own terms.
This culture, you've got to remember, didn't even exist 140 years ago. Iquitos was basically a trading post for the tribals that lived on different rivers. Many were fueding, and that was exacerbated a great deal with the advent of the rubber boom to the area--when large groups such as the Shipibo--I know we all love them, butttt--chose to offer a lot of other indigenous people to the slave trade at the time rather than be enslaved themselves.
So what you see is a city that grew up around the rubber boom, where forced slaves intermingled with one another, with Irish indentured servants, German fortune seekers, Black slaves who'd escaped eastern Brazil and even some Brazilian tribals who followed the rubber boom west from Manaus.
At the root of the culture of Iquitos is tribal life: Mostly hunting and gathering and fishing with a little agriculture thrown in during the rubber boom era. Births of girls severely outnumbered births of boys. To that, add that as hunters, men tended to die off in the jungle faster than women. Which made the disproportionate number of women even greater. As a result, men frequently had multiple wives. In Peru, a headman who had several--generally four or more--is called a curaka--a name still used by the women of Iquitos when talking about a playboy type.
It was important in tribal communities to have more than one wife. The simplest example I can give is my now-dead Matses headman friend, Pablo. He had four wives when I met him, though he had sons old enough to suggest he'd had earlier wives as well. Each of the four had their own duties: MaShe, the primary wife, ran the camp. Amelia breast fed all the babies of all the wives and kept the camp clean. Marta went hunting with Pablo and carried the meat back to camp (leaving him free to hunt any additional animals he saw along the way; the fourth, whose name escapese me, was the primary tender of the chacras, the yucca fields they had.
All of the women interchanged roles, but over several years, what I'm describing would best describe the situation.
MaShe couldn't have run the camp, taken care of babies, carried meat and tended fields alone. So she welcomed the other wives. And the wives, in turn, enjoyed each other's company. So much so that Pablo wasn't really needed. His job was to hunt, provide the food, then get out of the way. Not that the women didn't enjoy his company now and then--they did. But not all day, every day. That was women time when chores were done.
Now that model remains the model for Peruvian households in Iqiutos. Not the several wives, but the man's role. And any gringos married to Iquitenos will know what I'm talking about. Your role as the male is to hunt--these days that is probably a job, but still, it's to provide the food. After that you will be looked after, but you're not otherwise needed. The sisters, their mothers, the aunts, they will sit all day making food, washing clothes, doing their chores together; the man is not really included or invited into that circle very often.
And when you marry, chances are very good that your wife will pick your lover. Might be a sister of hers, a friend who has no man, but your lover will be given to you by your wife. And you are expected to take care of her, both intimately and financially--which might mean an entire second extended family. And if the man chooses more lovers, well, I've rarely known the women to care very much so long as the man continues to hunt--provide--for the primary family and extended primary family and the amante and extended family. If you can do all that and have more lovers, you are a curaka and that's admired by an awful lot of people. Means you can shoulder your burdens, take care of things. You're strong.
And while the hunter who cannot hunt any longer might well be fed poisoned soup by his wives--particularly if they are young enough to get new husbands--a man who cannot support his family will lose all respect of the women--from grandma to the aunts, to the wife, the amante and so forth. And if they can possibly move on to another man, particularly as a group, they will.
So I'm seeing that as a matriarchal society, not a patriarchal one. On the surface, men are allowed to walk around with their chests puffed out, but they know who runs the show. And they are so far outnumbered as a rule, that there's little they can do about it.

Getting Ready to Go: Wonderful Day

Okay, I recognize that I've not been treating you fairly. And I'm sorry. My only defense for not posting more often in the three months since I've been back from Peru is that I've been under the deadline gun every stinking week. And I don't mean with six weeks to do a story. I mean, like last week, I was handed a story on Thursday afternoon that was 1,500 words long and told to turn it into a cover story by Sunday. Then this week, at my weekly meeting of my alternative weekly, I was asked to produce two 2,000 word stories in the next nine days. Can do it but it takes all I've got. Which means you get short shrift.
And, just for the heck of it, since I came back from Peru on Feb 20 or so, I've done three cover stories, five 1.500 word stories, 5 400 word stories, two columns for Skunk and a cover for MPI One+ mag. And I've still got 3 stories to finish before I leave town on May 30.
So I apologize and can only say I had nothing to say. The work has left me empty. Like a vacuum. I've not promoted my book for two seconds, not tried to finish the next book--nearly done, but so far away--and have not begun the third one.
And I have not been lazy.
Apology accepted, I hope. I'm sorry I left you.
Tonight is Friday. Chepa, the wife/ex-wife (and much more the latter for those who just joined) picked up my Madeleina, 14 and going on 40, from school and was to take her to Academy Sports to buy sneakers. Instead, she took her to the mall, whatever that is, in north Dallas, a couple of hours from here. And evidently bought herself nice clothes but didn't find anything for my daughter, who leaves for Iquitos, Peru--middle of the Amazon--with me next week.
All okay. My daughter will get the clothes she needs. I'm guessing Chepa got what she needed. Tomorrow is another day, and Madeleina can take $100 or $200 and I'll drop her off wherever she wants for a couple of hours to shop without her mom, who happens to be a fantastic and sexy shopper (Okay, I fell in love with the girl 15 years ago, and even though the marriage didn't work out I used to love being invited into the fitting room to check out how the new jeans would look) using all the money or taking her to stores that are more suited to 40-year-olds than 14-year olds.
So right now I've got nice salmon, Chinese style, with sesame oil, sesame seeds, diced tomatoes, scallions, ginger, garlic and cilantro ready to do. I've also got bi-color corn, which I hope won't kill us, and fresh spinach, fresh broccoli and fresh asparagus (with a touch of balsamic vinegar) ready to go.
And Marco came by, and my son Italo came by to say he's ordered an oxygen sensor for my old green truck, and the goats are happy, and Boots the blind wonder dog is happy and the birds are happy and you know what? I'm happy. I'm thanking whatever god or powers that be that I woke up this morning breathing instead of dying in my sleep. Because this was a great day. And tomorrow will be another if they'll let me have it despite my cigarettes.
So that's my apology to you. I'm living, and living hard, working like a dog, barely making ends meet but who cares since there is a paper up on my wall that says I'm grateful that I have enough to pay my bills.
And I hope you can pay your bills. And if not, I hope you find new and better work that will let that happen.
Life is fantastic, even out on the edge. I'm hoping you're enjoying it.

Madeleina's New Movie

Well, while you've all been missing me, I've been living large and hard. I've written three cover stories, four 1500 word pieces, six 200 word news stories and two columns since I last wrote, not including yesterday. I've had a clutch replaced in my old green truck, wrote three or four pieces for Huffington Post, of which they only put up two so far, unfreakingbelieveably. Oh, and Italo and Sarah decided to get married, at my place, with me presiding, under the watchful eyes of over 100 guests, all of whom I am supposed to feed--including Chepa's boyfriend--just 48-hours after I return from 50 days in Peru. Good luck with all that shit. I'm almost just hoping they'll break up for a week or 10 days to give me a little time to get the yard and house and food in order!
Oh, and yesterday, at Chepa's, when I went there to pick up Madeleina for school, she came bursting out of her room to say: "Don't even start with me!" to me. What? I know Italian guys in my neighborhood growing up who used that phrase, and it meant something, trust me, but my 14-year old daughter? Just trying to get her to school on time? What was she going to do if I started with her? I mean, com'on...that's a serious phrase where I grew up. It meant just what it said: Don't start with me or this will end very badly for you.
Now my daughter thinks she can say that to dad? Oy, vey!
And now this evening, in the midst of a torrential downpour and extreme lightning storm, she's in the midst of making a new Youtube.com video. She publishes under the name madeleinag, so look for her. She's pretty fantastic. But she hasn't made a new video in three weeks.
Tonight she got in the creative spirit and decided to involve me: I was supposed to be the meanest dad in the world and when she decided to play in water several inches deep, she had me coming out and screaming at her. We did about 10 takes. Each time she was like: "Dad, you have to be more mean..."; or "Dad, sound like you're going to kill me..."
And I finally did, screaming harshly as I walked into the ankle deep water and off she ran screaming.
"That was good, dad. You're going to jail for that one. You were an absolute psychopath...."
"Thanks, baby. Keep the outtakes so the department of social services can see that you were the one directing the film,
okay?"
I had another scene where she took a soda, in total excitement, and I reached my hand in and scowled, "What are you doing? That's my soda!!!!"
I had a third scene but she cut me out of it.
So go to youtube.com tomorrow or the next day and check it out. My baby is one crazy woman when she decides to be. And she's a great director. I'll bet it's a good video.
She just said this one sucks. But who knows. Check it out anyway.
Me? I'm thinking of all of you and hoping you are having as much fun on the road to dying as I am. Which means living voraciously.
Oh, and Sierra, Alexa, and my granddaughter Taylor rain are all fine. So is Italo. So is Sara, my daughter in law, though I can never remember if she has an "h" at the end of her name or not. So is Chepa. So is Marco. We're all doing well. I think.
I hope.
And I hope you're all doing well, too.

Guy Asked Me for Advise...

Someone wrote to me asking for advise on how to become an investigative journalist. I really don't have any, so instead I told him the story of how it happened and I hope it helps him somehow. Here it is:
Dear X: I'm not sure what to tell you here. That's because I didn't start out as an investigative reporter. I started out writing plays, poetry and finally short stories. I got a book called the Writer's Market (I think) about 30 years ago and went through the listings of journals and such to figure out who might print my stories and such. I used to send out 5 every week. They were often the same story, just photocopied and sent out. And the first year, I averaged about 1 sale for every 50 stories I sent out. And that sale was usually for either nothing or $25.
The second year I sold about 2 for every 50 stories I sent out.
Then I had a breakthrough: I was normally taking about a month to write a story. Way too long. So I made a deal with myself: I was going to write one story a day for 30 days, and that meant write it completely so that I could send it out at the end of the week with the other stories I'd written that week.
It was crazy impossible but I did it: At the end of the month I had 12 short stories, three or four opinion pieces and a 160 page novella. Amazing. And armed with that supply I was able to start getting sales about 1 out of every 10 places I sent stories to. And one of those places, a non-paying music weekly paper in the Village in New York, had an editor who called me to ask me to write him a non-fiction piece. He'd already printed four or five of my stories and wanted to try me at non-fiction. So I did. And it was okay.
About a year later, I was headed down to the Amazon for the first time and I told him I'd write a report every week on what happened that week. Which I did. I spent a lot of time on those reports.
Unfortunately, I discovered when I got home that he hadn't printed them. All of the hand-written stories were in my apartment mailbox. Seems he'd gone out of business while I was away.
But I looked at those stories and thought they were good. So I went to the Writer's Market and looked at the non-fiction category of magazines and papers. And then I started sending those stories out. And damn if High Times didn't buy one, then a magazine called Overseas Living bought one, and then Walking Magazine bought one and someone else bought one. Of the seven pieces, I think I sold 4 or 5. Better yet, I earned about $1,700, from those sales, which pretty much paid for the whole trip.
So I decided to concentrate on non-fiction--since it apparently paid so much better. And High Times asked me to do another story on the Amazon, which I did, and then another. And then finally the bosses called me into their offices one day and asked if I could do an investigative piece. I said I'd never done one but that I would try.
They said they wanted me to get an interview with Dave Foreman, the head of a group called Earth First!, a great environmental action group. The problem was that the FBI had put the key members of Earth First! on their most wanted list and so nobody knew where to find them or how to get in touch with them.
So there I was being asked to find this guy whom the FBI couldn't find. Sure.
I thought about it for maybe a week. How the hell could I find Foreman? I read anything I could about him from before he was on the list and then got this: He came from either Montana or Wyoming, or at least had lived in those places. And he looked big. So I suddenly got the idea that he probably played high school football, since most big kids in the midwest do, and I thought I might call all the schools in those states to find out if he had ever gone there. That didn't go anywhere because schools wouldn't give me the information. So I thought about it again and it hit me that maybe he liked to have a beer and watch football...
So I decided to call every bar in both states to see if I could find him. I picked Wyoming first and I don't know why. I call information--this was long before computers--and asked the telephone operator for the names and phone numbers of the first three bars listed in alphabetical order in Wyoming. I would have asked for more but three was the limit per call. So I called information again and got three more numbers, then again, and again until I had some two hundred or so drinking joints in Wyoming. Took about two weeks to collect that information.
Then I began making calls, in alphabetical order. At each I would say: Hello, this is Peter Gorman, and I'm with High Times magazine. I'm trying to reach Dave Forman of Earth First! and if you know him can I give you my number for him to call me?" Or something like that. Of course no one admitted knowing him. That went on for a couple of weeks.
And then, while I was working somewhere in the middle of my list, I got a call one day. "Hello, is this Peter Gorman?"
"Yes."
Click.
That happened again the next day. And then the next day and maybe two more times until one day when I said "Yes," the person at the other end said: "This is Dave Foreman. You want to talk with me?"
And I did and I got the interview and right then, I knew I was going to try to be an investigative journalist. All it took was coming up with a way to get information that no one had thought of. Imagine how I felt knowing that the FBI had Foreman on their most wanted list and couldn't find him and here I was in my little apartment in New York City and I got to him. Incredible feeling.
After that, I took every hard story--and tried to come up with some of my own--that I coudl get my hands on for High Times. And then other magazines started calling me, sometimes for regular stories, sometimes for investigative pieces.
So what advise can I give you on becoming an investigative journalist? None, really. Just keep your eyes open, keep trying to sell stories somewhere, anywhere, and sooner or later an editor will cal you and you go from there and see where it leads. And if you can get in with a weekly alternative paper--I'm with the Fort Worth Weekly here in Texas--there is plenty of investigative stuff to work on. How to do that? Just keep trying, even when you're only selling one story out of 50. The key is to keep sending material out. I was sending out 250 pieces a year for four or five years before enough editors knew me that I didn't have to do that anymore.
I hope that helps.
Peter G

Easter at the Gorman's

Well, it's Easter at the Gorman's. I was hot under the collar last night. Started off good: I had a meeting with someone coming on my July Jungle Jaunt and she was great and will be a great addition to the trip. Then I raced home for a radio interview about ayahuasca that was scheduled for 5 PM. Or so I thought. It turned out to be scheduled for 9 PM, which was when Chepa and the girls were due over to color eggs. Now that is a tricky one because Chepa's boyfriend comes in from out of state to have Easter with his daughters Sierra and Alexa. Nonetheless, Chep generally brings them, and Sara and Italo tag along and Marco comes in as well.
This time, it didn't work that way. With the late time of the interview, nobody came. So it was just Madeleina and I and she was the only one coloring eggs as I was making us a very late dinner. And that was just so so sad. I know Madeleina is capable of entertaining herself, but I'm afraid I've got her doing too much of that. She really ought to be around her sisters and brothers more. Unfortunately, she's attached to me and pissed off at her mom--for not making her spend more time at her house--so she doesn't want to be there too often. Actually, she loves being there but wants her mom, Chepa, to drag her over there and pay attention to her. Which doesn't happen enough.
So I thought it was sad my girl was coloring the eggs all alone. But she did a gorgeous job. Everything the girl does is art.
This morning was different. The easter bunny got here early and made up baskets for everyone, then hid the 18 eggs and then while I was out for the corned beef I'm making for dinner--okay, I know it's not lamb, but then the kids don't like lamb--everybody showed up. Now that's the way I like it: Pure mayhem looking for those 18 eggs. And 30 minutes later they were still short two. Those guys have never found all of them. Not once. And the eggs are always in the same living room. And that bunny still makes a couple of them invisible.
And now, the corned beef is on. Italo is here. little Taylor is here. Madeleina's here. Sara and Marco will come by later. Laundry is on. I'm working a cover story.
It ain't perfect over here. Hasn't been for a long, long time. But for a broken up family, we still do okay.

Well, Earth Day, Good Friday, Good Evening

Well, today was/is Good Friday. For catholics--and I was an alter boy who considered the priesthood for a couple of early teen years, until I discovered that girls had, you know....things that were nice to touch but incompatible with being a priest--it's the holiest day of the year, the day Jesus was crucified. I don't know that it really was the day, but that guy was something special, that is for sure. As were Krishna, Buddha, Mohammed and some others. So I'm all for taking a day of reflection to consider what real love, real forgiveness means. Or three, or 10.
It was also, this year, Earth Day. Another reason to reflect. What are we doing, how well are we interacting. Let's face it: By now, even those who have not dropped acid or had ayahuasca or magic 'shrooms have to see that we're not living on a planet in the middle of the universe, but that we are being permitted by the benevolent spirit of the earth to stay here. She shrugs her shoulders, we're all gone. She knocks her plates together, we're finished. Not her. She'll be fine. "Got along without you before I met you baby, I'll get along without you when you're gone," goes the old jazz number. So I think it's a good day to stop and reflect on what we each are doing here to help or hinder, to better or worse, both to the planet and to each other. And we could probably use another 10 days a year for that reflection as well.
In that spirit, I sang today. Not just rock 'n roll, but some good, deep notes that come out of the medicine I've been served over the years. I hope you all felt the resonance. They're not my songs or notes so no ego here: I was just lent them for a little while and couldn't repeat them now if you begged me. But for a minute, they were in my mouth and heart and soul and needed to come out and so I opened my mouth and out they came. And I hope the Earth, and the spirits, and all of you felt them. Not even on this level, just in your soul singing a little. And I felt songs from others as well. So thank you.
And now I'm off to cook dinner. It's simple tonight.
While it's cooking I'm gonna cut some grass in the front lawn.
And reflect.
Not on killing grass, just on giving it a haircut. Just on trimming the nails, so to speak.
Have a great night, everyone. And a great Passover or Easter or whatever else you call this time of breaking into Spring and welcoming the warm air and the start of the growing of the fruits and vegetables.

Car Trouble

Okay, so this isn't a typically bouncy post on healing or Madeleina. This is a stinky post on car trouble. Specifically, my 1994 Oceanic Green Ford Ranger pickup's car/truck trouble.
The beautiful think has 299,271 miles on it. I'm watching because I want to be there when it hits 300,000, and 400,000 and half-a-million.
Marco has been using her since his car got totaled. Sometimes he uses my 1998 Ford Ranger--dark green--but lately I've commandeered that one since it's been playing better on the highway and can hit 70 mph without a strain, while the older beauty only hits 65 on a good day or downhill run.
But in the last week or two, Marco has been charged with eliminating a 10-foot pile of cement and old wood from his mom, Chepa's back yard. So he traded trucks as the newer Ranger has a little better pulling/carrying capacity and much better tires.
So I'm back to the oceanic green and loving it. She's my pal.
But today, after driving to Walmart and Fort Worth and Two Bucks, she started to smoke on the way home. I pulled onto the shoulder of I-35, the major drug running route from Mexico into the US. No problem, as I had/have no drugs. But I also didn't have a phone, so I had to run across the interstate, jump a fence, walk a wet gully, hit a factory and beg the use of the phone to call Italo to tell him I was stranded, had groceries, and needed a wrecker to pick the truck up and take it to my mechanic, Rick's.
I also told him to have Marco pick up Madeleina from school as I wasn't going to make it.
Italo decided not to call a wrecker till he reached me, about an hour on a 90-degree day. No big deal. He arrived, we called one, they said they'd be there in an hour. They were and brought my truck to Rick's. Then Italo brought me home--me slightly upset because I'll need a new/rebuilt transmission for $1400 on a truck with 300,000 miles, but don't have a choice as I need the truck--to Chepa's, where I secured my other truck, the one Marco has been using.
Darned if I didn't find that the bed of the pickup is loaded with about 3,000 pounds of cement pieces, more than enough to wreak the truck. Damned if I don't have to go to the dump first thing tomorrow so I don't lose another transmission. Damned if I have not figured out how Marco destroyed the transmission in the older ocean green truck--with 3,000 pound loads of cement in a pickup meant to carry half a ton, plus passengers.
I decided not to rail at Marco. Instead, I took my dark green truck and drove home. It was about 6:35 PM.
There I was met with a scowling Madeleina.
"Dad! I told you I had a concert tonight at 6 PM! Why didn't you pick me up? I missed it!"
"Honey, I'm sorry. I was stuck out on a highway waiting for a tow-truck. Why didn't mom take you?"
"Dad, mom went out Saturday to Jessica's, then went out Sunday to Monica's and she hasn't been home since."
"Why didn't Marco take you?"
"You were supposed to take me...."
"I know, darling, but I was sitting on a highway at 3:45, on the way to picking you up at 4."
"I doubt that..."
"Ask Italo. He came and saved me."
"Well, I missed the concert. Thanks a lot."
"I'm sorry. What else can I say. I was 20 miles from here on an interstate."
"But I had faith you would make it here..."
I smiled.
"Thank you baby. But in the future, if I'm with a broken truck 20 miles away and you have an hour to get somewhere, ask your brother to take you if mom's not home. Even if I could have walked home I had no way to get you back to school. And I was not going to abandon a truck and groceries on a highway..."
"The older I get," she said, "the more I realize you're a long way from superman..."
I didn't say anything. I know I'm not superman. I'm just dad. And when she was little, it seemed I could do anything, get her anything, fix anything. Now that she's becoming a woman/a person, she sees the limitations. I've always known they were there but for her to see them is a letdown.
I'm sorry baby. Your daddy is just another person. I'm working in your corner, but even my best isn't always good enough. Welcome to the world, little girl. I'm sorry you have to be here. Cause it's a much nicer place when you think there is someone who can, in a pinch, fix it all.

The Amazing Hypocracy of the Far Right

Okay, now that I got my personal feelings about abortion out in my previous blog (see: The Abortion Issue), I want to just take a look at that issue again for a moment. But this time not from a personal point of view. This time not from the heart of someone who has contributed to abortions. This time from a simpleton's view of the spoken word.
In these hours leading up to a possible federal government (temporary) shutdown over the budget--it's 6:07 PM Central Time as I write this--I'm thinking about several of the riders the far right wing of the republican party tagged onto the budget. There was, of course, several abortion items: No more federal funding for Planned Parenthood, no funds to any country that might use some of those funds to fund abortions; and particularly no more money to or involvement with the United Nations Population Fund, which supports family services.
Those are three of the vitally important riders that the far right wing of the republican party cannot live without and which must be attached to the budget in order for them to vote to keep the government open for business.
Okay, so those people, those congressmen--and their counterpoints n the senate--need those changes because of the value of the fetus. Save the fetus at all costs. Don't give a government anti-malarial pills (which I don't like either) or help with fresh water in a cholera-plagued country if ANY funds given to that country might pay for abortion. Not if the cholera funds are being misdirected, mind you, just if ANY funds given to a country might result in abortions, then NO FUNDING for that country, even if it happened to be in the middle of a nuclear meltdown or a cholera outbreak.
But here is simpleton me. I'm just a kid from Queens, New York who went to catholic school, was taught all sorts of nonsense about the church and christianity--along with the very very good stuff about taking care of your neighbor and treating others like you would like to be treated, or better--and now looks at these riders to the budget and shakes my head. Maybe I'm missing something. Tell me if I am. But the riders don't end with abortion. They go on to insist that the budget won't be passed unless the EPA, the Environmental Protection Agency, the agency created to monitor and help protect our environment, is no longer permitted to regulate how many tons of greenhouse gasses a factory is permitted to emit. Let's face it: We're talking about the Midlothian, Texas cement factories burning tires to generate electricity and poisoning whole communities. That's what not regulating by the EPA finally means, I think.
And then the far right wing of the republican party is saying in another rider that they won't pass the budget if any funding goes toward health care reform.
And then the far right wing of the republican party says they will not pass the budget unless there is a commitment that no monies will be spent on the new consumer protection bureau.
So simpleton me, the kid from Queens, who used to play in Dupey's field before it was developed and was an alter boy at St. Mels o 154th street, starts thinking: And when I do I'm thinking: Wait a minute! You don't want abortions. Okay. I disagree but okay, you're entitled to your opinion.
But after you want to force women to have babies they don't want, you want unlimited smog, no health care reform and no consumer protection from preying credit cards, banks and other lending agencies.
So I'm thinking, let me get this straight: the far right contingent of the republican party is insisting that a fetus be carried to term to become a human, and then they want that human sick from unregulated greenhouse gasses, with no health care, and in debt to uncontrolled credit agencies?
Do you see what I'm seeing?
I'm not seeing the logic here.
But then maybe I'm missing something.
When I grew up in Whitestone, Queens in the 1950s and 60s, the mafia was all around us. Maybe half-a-dozen players lived right on our little block. Dozens lived within a few blocks. But they way they worked was this: If you needed money and went for a loan, they warned you against it. They said they were bad men who would hurt you if you couldn't pay it back. They tried to convince you not to take the loan. Same with everything they did: They always tried to talk you out of illegally gambling, looking for girls, drugs and so forth. Finally, if you screamed enough, they'd provide the vice you wanted.
Those were good bad guys. They were upfront about the deal.
These people who want to say it's a sin or wrong, or insane to have an abortion and insist that women who conceive by accident then carry the fetus to term as a human baby, are the same people asking for unregulated atmospheric gasses, no funding for good health care and no control of the predatory lenders when they reach out for help.
Tell you what: My mafia was always cleaner than that. Much much more upfront than that.

The Abortion Issue

This is a very personal blog that I put up on the huffington post today. It probably won't be approved until tomorrow. But I thought it needed to be said and so I've said it there and will say it here. For those who don't want to hear about the abortion issue on a personal level, just skip this one.

It's Friday, April 8. A government shutdown looms tonight if a budget can't be hammered out in the next 15 hours. At issue isn't budget cuts anymore it seems; at issue is abortion, primarily, and greenhouse gas regulation. The New York Times ran a wonderful editorial this morning pointing that out. The far right wing of the Republican party is demanding that to pass the budget it will have to include riders promising that Planned Parenthood will receive no federal financing, that the U.S. will not provide any aid to countries that might use some of those monies for abortions, and that the U.S. not provide any support for the United Nations Population Fund, which supports family planning services. Also, there is a rider that prohibits the EPA from regulating greenhouse gasses and another that prohibits any funding to health care reform. Oh, and then one more, according to the NY Times, that no monies be spent funding the new consumer protection bureau.
I've a mind to go off on each of these assaults on humanity, but I'll restrict myself to the abortion issue because that one is one I've been personally involved with. On numerous occasions.
When I was young, I lived with a beautiful woman. We lived together for a long time, about 10 years. During that time she got pregnant several times. Not because we were careless or didn't care about her body: she got pregnant on the pill, with condoms that broke, while using the diaphragm. We were a couple of Irish kids from large families and were both born to make a lot of babies. We were just built for it.
The problem was that we were not ready to raise them. At least I was not ready for a family. And if I had chosen, or if we had chosen, to let those spirits take on flesh, I would not have been a good father. I would have been a resentful father. I would have seen those spirits in flesh as humans and thought they held me back. So rather than make them suffer, she had abortions. Was it selfish? Yes. Should we simply have abstained from sex? Possibly. But try telling that to people in love at 20-25-30. Should I have simply been more mature and decided that my dreams, and her dreams too, were unimportant and should be sacrificed to the spirit we'd invited to her womb? Maybe, but I wasn't mature enough then, so that wasn't an option. Should I, we, have just had a bunch of babies and lived with it the way you live with a hand of cards you're dealt? No. That would not have been in those babies interest. I would have minimally been passively-aggressive, toward the woman I loved and toward the babies she bore.
In the end, after about 15 years together altogether, we broke up. She found a new man and had a beautiful family. Seven years after we broke up I fell in love, married, inherited--gleefully--two children from a previous marriage, and then my wife and I made our own beautiful baby.
Fatherhood didn't come easily: They boys were a handful and I found that I not only had a stern "dad voice" but that I used it more often than I should have. But I caught myself and tried to corral that. And I've been, I think, a good father, a good dad.
The reason was maturity. I just grew up a little by the time I was 42 and becoming a father.
Back to the abortions: We took them seriously. We knew we'd inadvertently invited a spirit who wanted to experience tactile sensations--have a body that could feel, taste, touch, hear, talk, make love, get ill, play sports--into the initial steps of having that body. It's a nine month transition and we stopped that transition from spirit to flesh with each abortion. And we cried over it, mourned some, and prayed that that spirit, those spirits, would find another home in which to grow a body, a home that would welcome them and be open to all that was entailed.
And when my own daughter was born, when the doctor had me pull her free and she opened her eyes while halfway out and in my hand and looked up at me and said "hep, hep"--which I swear sounded like "help, help"--I looked down at her and told her that it was too late. She couldn't go back in; she'd made her choice to go from spirit to flesh and that as long as she was here I would do all I could to make a place for her that was warm and full of love.
And I have. And my now-ex has as well.
If I, if the first woman I lived with and I had allowed those other spirits to take on a body, the reception would not have been as welcoming. And so while I wish I hadn't mistakenly invited those spirits into that beautiful woman's womb, setting them free to find a warmer reception was, in my opinion, the best thing to do for them.
Selfish? I'm sure. It was still the right thing to do. Giving spirit flesh is a wonderful job, but one best done with the right partner at the right time, I think.

Getting Old, Unhappy Camper

Okay, so I'm getting a little older. I turned 60 in February--don't worry if you missed it, I'm still taking gifts--and feel about 34. I'm strong as an ox, won't flinch from a fight--though I was never very good at winning them--and still have a heart/mind/soul of a kid.
Nonetheless, in the last few years, I have suffered some physical setbacks. Mostly, I had that damned intestinal ulcer that I had no idea I had until it burst and sent 3 liters of really awful junk into my innards, buring my organs. My doc saved me, but then I had to have it sewn up again, and then a third time. Not good. Then there was the flesh eating spider bite that left holes all over my legs and arms. Then there was the septic infection that ate the flesh from my calves and ankles. Then there was the broken ankle that I was sure would repair itself without interference--which it did after two years of pain with every step I took. Plus, it took San Pedro to actually do the fixing, but I only got that by walking up to near 9,500 feet at Machu Picchu, from a base of 7,500, with each step a very very painful move.
Then this year the damned flesh eating infection came back--not so strong, just in about 16-20 places on my legs--and I decided to treat it by ignoring it. I suspect it came back from the original spider bite and that it was time to just beat it on personal power. HA!
Okay, plus, I got the damned dengue in Iquitos.
Which leads me to this: While I've always been a 120/80 guy with blood pressure, when I was tested with dengue and the infection in my legs, I was suddenly a 170/105 guy.
My doc, someone who is a genuine emergency room doc and who has been on two trips with me, suggested that the infection and dengue caused the increased pressure.
Now he's not sure.
Cause I've been back in the states for six weeks, dengue long gone, and the infection nearly dormant--except for two sores that really hurt a lot!!!!!!
And I took blood pressure twice a day for two weeks, same time, same bp machine. And I was about 160/105 the first time each day, then 151/100 the second time, half an hour later and 1/2 mile walked between readings.
So doc sent me bp medicine. He knows I feel strong and don't want no damned medicine.
And then last week, my second reading for the last three days dipped to 96, 93, 91. So I told doc that I didn't want his medicine, that I wanted another week to see if having lost about 13 pounds--an estimate--in the last few months, and having added riding my bike--with a stationary machine--plus walking an extra couple of miles of fast walking daily might not bring it down into the 80s on the dyastolic.
Well, yesterday and today were both at 178/110 and second readings were about 161/104 and doc said it didn't matter how I felt, that those are bad numbers. Bad numbers.
So I at a damned pill.
We'll see what happens.
I am not a happy camper. I don't take pills unless they are for fun. Or basic ibuprofin.
And now I'm old and fat and bald and taking blood pressure medicine.
I'm on the way out.
I'm a goner.
\ I'm useless.
HA! I am going to be walking the Amazon in 10 years!
If I were you, I'd bet on me.
Even if it's a Peter G who is taking freaking blood pressure medicine.
UGH!